Rationality is a tool. Let's see how many things we can apply it to.

Tag Archives: children

Brain Crack is the stuff in the back of your mind that you wish you could bring into existence that you hold onto, hoping and hoping to write about it or create it. But it’s better to let it out, to let other people see it and add to it and make it better, and maybe one of them will make it happen. Here’s some brain crack I have lying around:

When children are old enough, they should run part of the classes they’re in. It forces them to do research, prepare work, be accountable to their peers and work on something that has literal, immediate real world applicability. It cultivates confidence and social skills, and also lets them be creative about the kind of class they would want to see and want to be in. It would certainly give the teacher something to think about. Might take too much time out of class, but maybe it could be extra credit?

Everyone with a social security number should be automatically registered to vote when they turn 18. They can just show up at the polling place on election day and vote.

Open a restaurant with one table. Everything on the table is for everyone, so if you’re full, you just leave what’s left over for the next person. People who can’t pay can just sit at the table and wait for people to order (there would be some kind of maximum occupancy). People who can might need to buy some more.

Every church, mosque, synagogue and other house of worship should have an area where homeless people can sleep. It can be separate from the main area, but just somewhere warm so people don’t have to sleep in the cold. (I can think of a lot of problems with this one, actually).

What if instead of fixed distances between two points there were fixed times between two points? So if you walk faster, you would be walking a shorter longer distance. What would that look like? Is that even meaningful?

I’ve been thinking about movies that play with atheist = bad, religious = good dynamic but also the liberal = good, religious right = evil dynamic. What would that look like? The good guys are super intense religious people but still good, and then bad people are atheists somehow? Not sure. Would love thoughts.

I’m not defending these ideas to the death, or even at all. I’m sure many of them are morally ridiculous or economically unfeasible. They’re just ideas. But I’d love to hear thoughts on them!

And that’s the end of blogathon! Thanks everyone for the favorites and retweets and comments! Until next time!